Out in the Vortex: Abrahm DeVine and the Burden of Queer Athletes

After Olympic hopeful Abrahm DeVine confronted the institutional homophobia of the elite swimming world, the retaliation of Stanford University and Team USA coaches led him to quit his long-life passion. While mourning this loss, DeVine seeks for queer community working in gay bars of San Francisco. Here, in the dark of the nightclub, he meets Cuban refugee and filmmaker Lázaro Gonzalez, who never learned to swim. Out in the Vortex documents the return to the water as a teacher passing on a true love.

In 2019, DeVine’s cry for help was unheard by the same institutions profiting from his success. Instead, Stanford coaches issued a statement denying a homophobic environment, and effectively sweeping the critique of institutional homophobia under the rug. The same team culture that protected rapist Brock Turner, accused their best male swimmer of "behavior issues. DeVine, previously praised by the institution after becoming a National Champion and awarded Stanford’s Student-Athlete of the Year, was now unable to speak about a macho and homophobic team culture surrounding him.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAiWxmIzwcw

Before graduating from Stanford, DeVine joined the Elite Team in San Diego to continue training for the Olympics. However, during the Olympic Trials, he was disqualified for a technical error in a flip turn while winning his race and about to qualify for the finals. Notably, any other disqualification of a high-level swimmer in that competition was overturned[1][2][3], leaving many to suspect that his disqualification was a result of two years of speaking openly and reporting two of the Olympic coaches for homophobia.

Coming Out in the Spotlight

As in many sports, queer representation remains significantly lacking or tied to corporate profits. In other cases, follows homophobic and transphobic agendas. For instance, DeVine left Stanford shortly after coming out. A few years later, trans swimmer Lia Thomas was a victim of a similar scandal and end up banned from international competition by World Aquatics. Thomas’s expulsion took place shortly after becoming the first openly trans woman to win an NCAA Division I championship.

Around the same time that DeVine was crashing with the Olympic dream, González was claiming asylum in the United States and learning English. In Cuba, he was one of the few open queer filmmakers,  and like many other independent cultural producers, faced constant state surveillance and political repression. Those tensions increased when he started working on a project called Sexile, about the largest sexual purge in that country. Ironically, the desire to make cinema beyond assimilationist agendas, led him to a similar fate than DeVine.  

Since DeVine’s complaints, legislatures in more than two dozen U.S. states have also passed laws restricting trans athletes from competing as themselves, and immigrants dreams are portrayed as dangerous. All the while, Stanford posts rainbow flags on their Instagram. Despite the proliferation of rainbow swimsuits and universities’ endless claims of commitment to diversity, queer athletes often navigate the realities behind the media facade alone.

Struggle for Justice and Redemption

It is in this turbulent context of pop swimming media that Out in the Vortex claims the camera to fight the compulsory heterosexuality of dominant sports representation—one that silences the fastest openly gay swimmer in the world while giving voice to Gaines’s crusade, as a contemporary Anita Bryant. Through television, radio, Instagram, advertisements, etc. this consistent mediatic negation of queer lives, runs like a persistent noise that reverberates globally. Shot between San Francisco and Seattle, the film utilizes this noise as a backdrop that disturbs the possibility of love. So, filming becomes a fight for love. In the aftermath of a queer athletic life, swimming can no longer be about winning, but about loving freely. What this film wants to display, is the triumph of queer life against the grain of the hyper-competitive world of collegiate, professional swimming, and economic success.

A Story of Love and Resilience

In Out in the Vortex, the pool, once a chaotic maelstrom of discipline, identity, and homophobia, becomes a place of touch, breath, instruction, and dialogue about two experiences of sexual expulsion. Either in their refusal to capitalism, or to a socialist regime, each of them share a similar expectation of justice, and freedom. The film documents that desire. The water, as a vehicle of feelings, moves between those bodies that do not fit within the schemas of two nations in conflict. From that friction emerges a dialogue, while figures of the swimming world, such as Riley Gaines, create a nationalistic,  anti-trans, and anti-queer rhetoric.

This film is not a personal catharsis for DeVine; it is a call to action. In a time when attacks on trans and other queer athletes are increasing, it is crucial to speak out and advocate for a more equitable and inclusive sports environment. DeVine’s story is a powerful reminder of the importance of standing up against injustice.

Connecting with Queer Archiving

The production of this film aligns with González's years long passion for queer counterarchiving, a theme that has been central to previous films such as Masks, Pandemos, "Sexile" and "Villa Rosa." Documenting and preserving the stories of queer individuals is vital for creating a more inclusive historical record and for providing representation to those who have long been marginalized. Through this film, DeVine’s journey will be archived not just as a personal story of resilience but as a crucial chapter in the broader narrative of LGBTQ+ athletes fighting for equality.

Out in the Vortex will provide an opportunity for audiences to engage with the realities faced by athletes like DeVine and to understand the broader implications of discrimination in sports. More importantly, it offers hope and validation to young queer athletes who might be grappling with their identities and the fear of acceptance.